Social media isn't just about brand awareness; it can drive sales for your business. Your social media has great potential for aiding business growth. 23% of participants said they use social media to learn about products and services. However, not every social media platform has the same audience. Investing in the proper channels is essential. Here are guidelines for getting revenue from social media.
1) Use The Social Channel That Your Followers Use
Determine where your target customers spend their time online and use the same social channels. Concentrate on a few platforms rather than wasting resources building multiple accounts.
Conduct a thorough analysis of your target demographic. Dig into the profiles of your current customers or find common characteristics of a target audience. Once you know who buys your products/services (or who you want to become a buyer), you should also know which platforms they use.
A couple of tips to keep in mind:
Most people use Facebook, but it has lost favor with the younger crowd (between ages 18 and 29). If you're skewing toward a millennial audience, you may want to focus your efforts on Instagram and Snapchat.
Your target audience's age does not necessarily tell you about their buying trends. Make sure that whatever audience you've picked exhibits buying behavior in the channels they favor.
Bottom line: Be present on social platforms where your target audience is present. You increase your chances of driving sales if you can reach your audience where they're present.
2) Create Great Content But Don't Make It Sound Salesy Or Pushy
While prioritizing quality over quantity sounds obvious, digital marketers can still get it wrong. Social media users are savvy and mediocre content is less engaging. Spend time creating smaller batches of high-quality content. Share your content at a pace you and your prospects can handle. Remember, content shouldn't feel pushy or salesy. Social media platforms are not solely meant for buying and selling.
“I encourage my clients not to focus so directly on sales when it comes to social unless they’re driving an ad campaign with revenue-driven objectives. That’s not the point of social media, although it does happen often because of the role social plays in the consideration process.” – Chelsea McDonald, Sr. Social Media Strategist at DEG Digital.
Here are a few suggestions for posts that achieve a good balance between salesy and helpful:
Create images inspired by real-life situations.
Post pictures and videos that include tips for using your products.
Share photos of prospects using or engaging with your products.
3) Make It Easy For People To Buy On Social Channels
Pinterest's Buyable Pins
In mid-2014, Pinterest introduced buyable pins. These are found in related pins, search results, and enterprise profiles. They allow customers to purchase products without leaving Pinterest, creating a frictionless shopping experience.
Pinterest's Rich Pins
There are four different types of rich pins:
Article pins let customers save stories that they deem essential.
Product pins include a specific product's location, availability, and pricing.
App pins feature a one-click install button, letting prospects download your app without leaving Pinterest.
Recipe pins feature serving size, ingredients, and cooking time.
Shoppable Posts on Instagram
Shoppable posts are a native integration that helps Instagram users tag products and purchase them instantly from their organic newsfeed.
Shoppable Tags In Instagram Stories
Shoppable Tags in Instagram Stories allow businesses to tag physical products/services. Users can view an item's description, price, and name when they click on it.
4) Using Instagram To Generate Leads
Here's how to combine Instagram features with effective calls to action to generate leads for your business.
Make Sure Your Instagram Profile Is Business-Ready And Properly Formatted. You must connect your profile bio to a lead-generating landing page to generate leads on Instagram. However, ensure your profile includes other significant components:
Explain why visitors should pay attention to your business.
Describe what you do and who you are.
Ensure you upload a quality profile image.
Most importantly, your bio must have a value-added proposition if an audience clicks on your link. It should have a CTA (call to action) as well.
Include CTAs in Your Organic Posts
Engaging content in your feed posts is also a great way to generate leads. To achieve lots of reach for a CTA feed post, encourage your active followers to share their Instagram stories.
Share Instagram Stories To Generate Leads
The Swipe-Up Link on Instagram Stories drives viewers to a certain link. This is a sure way to generate leads using IG Stories. You can also include a CTA in your story posts.
5) Use LinkedIn For Brand Awareness
With LinkedIn, your business can establish strategic partnerships, generate leads and build awareness in the following ways:
LinkedIn Groups
One benefit of using LinkedIn is the capability to create a branded group. This group lets your business run a discussion board connected to your industry. It allows you to create a community around your expertise, service, or product. LinkedIn groups offer excellent visibility for a business because your logo will be visible on each member's profile.
Group owners can post various media such as images and videos, and instant notifications allow real-time conversations to take place much easier. Currently, there are millions of LinkedIn groups. For yours to stand out, you must encourage your members to be active. For instance, let members post updates and articles so that other group members can benefit from them.
LinkedIn Programmatic Display Ads
With LinkedIn Display Ads, you can easily extend your current online display to LinkedIn. To do so, you can either buy display ads specifically via a private auction or add LinkedIn to your current programmatic buy.
Display Ads show in the right column of the LinkedIn desktop. Some advantages to consider vs. other social media advertising platforms:
LinkedIn only offers a single ad for every page
The ad is placed above the fold and has more than 80 percent viewability!
LinkedIn Sponsored InMail
Sponsored InMail is great for delivering private messages to target audiences at scale. To raise brand awareness using LinkedIn Sponsored InMail, you must craft a great message. If you're not sure how to do this, keep in mind that you can always hire an experienced copywriter to assist you. Either way, note that Sponsored InMail is most effective for boosting brand awareness if used to share thought-leadership assets that add actual value to your customer.
We recommend using a personalized message from a thought leader in your business or a relevant expert.
6) Paid Ads
Posting frequently to social media and replying to comments alone is not enough to drive sales. The most suitable strategy for making the most of your social accounts is paid ads. While organic reach on social channels drops, paid media helps you reach and boost your audiences quickly.
Every social media channel has advertising abilities. Facebook, for instance, features extensive targeting tools. This makes it easy for businesses to develop successful campaigns.
Most importantly, the Facebook ads application lets businesses amplify posts to achieve any of these four objectives:
Click-throughs
Reach
Impressions
Engagement
Thus, your results can be customized depending on your goals.
Conclusion
I have covered some of the most effective strategies for driving sales using social media channels (LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, etc.). These methods involve having an active presence where your prospects are, and creating educational, optimized content without focusing solely on sales.
Further, the strategies involve:
Simplifying the buying process.
Using Instagram to generate leads.
Using paid ads and LinkedIn for brand awareness.
What are your thoughts?
Sources:
Effective Ways To Drive Sales With Social Media. https://www.crazyegg.com/blog/6-effective-ways-to-drive-sales-with-social-media-in-2019/
How to optimize your social media strategy to increase sales. https://www.dhlestore.com/blog/e-commerce/how-to-optimize-your-social-media-strategy-to-increase-sales?download=true
How To Increase Sales Through Social Media. https://www.mwb-agency.com/blog/how-to-increase-sales-through-social-media/
Social Media Campaigns in Singapore: What Works - MediaOne. https://mediaonemarketing.com.sg/social-media-campaigns-singapore-works/
What are rich pins? + How to use them to maximise sales .... https://willowkaii.com/2021/02/26/what-are-rich-pins-how-to-use-them-to-maximise-sales/